Attorney files 155-question list with MWCD

Jim BrewerPublished: July 27, 2006 12:00AM

By JIMBREWER
T-G Staff Writer
NEW PHILADELPHIA New Philadelphia attorney David Blackwell has buried literally buried the Muskingum Watershed Conservancy District under a list of 155 questions.
The attorney, who said he is representing himself in a case as an owner of property in two of the 18 counties that comprise the MWCD, Tuscarawas and Guernsey, said the questions are part of the discovery process designed to flush out information on the MWCDs position on certain issues and matters of record.
This all leads to my premise that the MWCD is going about the process of assessing all property owners in the district improperly, Blackwell said in a telephone conversation Tuesday. They are not following the law. My property is not affected by the work they are assessing property to do, and therefore shouldnt be subject to assessment.
He said the MWCDs original reaction to requests for admissions, filed with the Tuscarawas and Guernsey County Common Pleas Courts on June 6, was that they be dismissed. The courts have not dismissed the requests, however. He has revised and expanded them twice since the original filing.
MWCDs public information officer, Darren Lautenschlager, said the questions are being considered by the districts legal counsel.
Questions in Blackwells request cover the full gamut of actions and responsibilities of the MWCD. For instance, one asked the MWCD admit that the communities of Cambridge and Cadiz are the only ones which draw their personal water consumption needs from MWCD reservoirs.
Another asks for the MWCD to admit that the MWCD owns the shoreline surrounding the reservoirs.
Some delve into early district history, like admit that the Corps of Engineers received a federal construction grant of $22,090,000 for the Muskingum District on or about Dec. 29, 1933, to implement the Official Plan.
And admit that the original appraisal of benefits and damages, filed Feb. 26, 1936 under the Official Plan, affected only about 32,000 properties within the MWCD region.
Blackwell said he is one of several parties that have filed requests for admission, or other forms of objections and exceptions to MWCDs proposed $270 million assessment program, a program that would raise funds for major improvement and maintenance plans within the district over the next 20 years.
That plan is technically called the Amendment of the Official Plan of the MWCD, which has been under consideration for the past five or more years.